On the First Intellect (al-ʿAql al-Awwal), and that it is the wellspring of Jibrīl (peace be upon him) from Muhammad (God bless him and grant him peace)

Know -- may God grant us and you success, and direct you to your [own] self and guide you to the realizing of it --

that the First Intellect is the place of the divine knowledge-form (al-shakl al-ʿilmī al-ilāhī) in existence.

Because it is the Supreme Pen; then knowledge descends from it to the Guarded Tablet, so it is the summary [version] of the Tablet, and the Tablet is its detailing.

Nay, it is the detailing of the knowledge of the divine summary, and the Tablet is the place of its determination and its descent.

Then, in the First Intellect, of the divine secrets, is what the Tablet cannot hold -- just as, in the divine Knowledge, is what the First Intellect is not a place for; so the divine Knowledge is the Mother of the Book (umm al-kitāb).

And the First Intellect is the Clear Leader (al-imām al-mubīn), and the Tablet is the Clear Book (al-kitāb al-mubīn); so the Tablet is led by the Pen, following it, and the Pen -- which is the First Intellect -- rules over the Tablet, detailing the summarized matters in the realm of the divine Knowledge expressed by the [letter] Nūn.

And the difference between the First Intellect, the Universal Intellect, and the everyday intellect [is]:

that the First [Intellect] is a light of divine knowledge that appeared in the first of its created, determining descents -- and if you wish, say: the first detailing of the divine summary.

And for this he (peace be upon him) said: "Truly the first thing God created was the intellect"; so it is the nearest of the created realities to the divine realities. Then the Universal Intellect (al-ʿaql al-kullī) is the upright scale (al-qisṭās al-mustaqīm), so it is the balance of justice in the dome of the deciding Tablet. And in sum, the Universal Intellect is the reasoning-faculty (al-ʿāqila): that is, the luminous apprehending [faculty] by which the forms of the sciences deposited in the First Intellect appeared -- not as one without knowledge of these matters says.

Because [to take] the Universal Intellect [to be] an expression for the comprehending of the individuals of the genus "intellect," from every possessor of a reasoning-faculty -- this is refuted, because the intellect has no multiplicity, since it is a single indivisible substance (jawhar fard).

And it is, in the likeness, the element of the human, angelic, and jinn spirits -- not of the bestial spirits. Then the everyday intellect (ʿaql al-maʿāsh) is the light weighed by the canon of thought (al-qānūn al-fikrī).

So it apprehends only by the instrument of thought; then its apprehending is by [only] one of the aspects of the Universal Intellect -- it has no way to the First Intellect, because the First Intellect is transcendent above the bond of analogy and the confinement of the scale [of discursive reason].

Rather, it is the place of the issuing of the holy revelation to the center of the self-spirit. And the Universal Intellect is the just balance for the deciding matter, and it is transcendent above being confined by one canon rather than another; rather its weighing of things is by every measure.

And the everyday intellect has only one measure, which is thought; and it has only one pan, which is habit; and it has only one extremity, which is the known; and it has only one prong, which is nature.

Unlike the Universal Intellect, for it has two pans: one of them Wisdom, the second Power. And it has two extremities: one the divine requisites, the second the natural receptivities. And it has two prongs: one the divine Will, the second the created requisites. And it has various measures; and of its measures is that there is no measure -- and for this the Universal Intellect is the upright scale, because it does not deviate and does not wrong,

[weighing not] upon [just] one pan, and nothing escapes it -- unlike the everyday intellect, for it may deviate and many things may escape it, and [it has only] one extremity.

So the analogy of the everyday intellect is not upon verification, but by way of conjecture (khars).

And God (exalted is He) said: "Perish the conjecturers" (51:10) -- and they are those who weigh the divine matters by their [discursive] intellects, so they fall short, because they have no balance; rather they are [mere] conjecturers. And conjecture (khars) has the meaning of supposition,

So the relation of the First Intellect, for example, is the relation of the sun; and the relation of the Universal Intellect is the relation of the water upon which the light of the sun fell; and the relation of the everyday intellect is the relation of the ray of that water when it falls upon a wall.

So looking, for example, into the water takes the form of the sun soundly, and takes its light clearly -- as though, were he to see the sun, the difference between the two would hardly appear.

Except that the one looking at the sun raises his head upward, and the one looking at the water lowers his head downward; so likewise the Universal Intellect lowers, by the light of its heart, to the place of the Book, and takes from it the sciences connected to the existents.

And it is the limit that God (exalted is He) deposited in the Guarded Tablet.

Unlike the First Intellect, for it receives from the Real by itself.

Then the Universal Intellect, when it takes from the Tablet -- which is the Book -- takes its knowledge either by the canon of Wisdom or by the measure of Power, by [some] canon or without [a] canon.

So this inductive [reading] from it is a lowering; because [the Tablet] is of the universal created necessities, [the Universal Intellect] hardly errs, except in what God has kept to Himself.

For God, if He sends it down to existence, sends it down only to the First Intellect -- thus is the way (sunna) of God in what He keeps to Himself of His sciences, [namely] that it is not [to be] found in the Guarded Tablet:

And know that the Universal Intellect may [serve to] lure on the people of wretchedness, so that it is opened to them in the field of their caprices, not in other than it.

So they gain [insight] into the secrets of Power from beneath the curtains of the existents, the spheres, the light, the radiance, and the like of that.

So they go to the worship of these things; and that is by God's stratagem with them, and the subtle point in it [is]:

that God (glory be His) discloses Himself in the garb of these things which they worship, so these [people] apprehend [them] by the Universal Intellect and say that they are the agent[s].

Because the Universal Intellect does not pass beyond the cosmos, so they do not know God by it.

Because the intellect does not know God except by the light of faith (nūr al-īmān); otherwise it is not possible that the intellect know Him by its consideration and its standing -- whether it be an everyday intellect or a Universal Intellect.

Granting that our imāms went to [the view] that the intellect is of the means of knowledge -- and this is by way of latitude, for the establishing of the proof, and it is our school. Except that I say: this knowledge gained by the intellect is confined, restricted by the proofs and the traces; unlike the knowledge of faith, for it is absolute. So the knowledge of faith is connected to the Names and Attributes, and the knowledge of the intellect is connected to the traces.

So it, even if it be a knowledge, is yet not, with us, the knowledge sought by the people of God (exalted is He).

Then the relation of the everyday intellect to the Universal Intellect is the relation of the one looking to the ray; and the ray is not [present] except from one direction, so it does not reach the form of the sun, nor know its shape, nor know the light shaped in the water -- neither its length nor its breadth.

Rather it conjectures by supposition and estimation; so once it says [the light is] long, by what it supposes is evidence of length, and once it says [it is] broad likewise -- so it is upon no verification of the matter.

And likewise the everyday intellect, for it shines only from one direction, which is the direction of consideration and proof by analogy in thought.

So its possessor, when he takes to knowing God by it, does not err.

And for this, whenever we say that God is not apprehended by the intellect, we mean by it the everyday intellect; and whenever we say that He is known by the intellect, we mean by it the First Intellect.

And for this God (exalted is He) said: "Perish the conjecturers, who are heedless in a flood [of ignorance]" (51:10-11).

And they were "perished" only for their deciding by what they conjectured, and their ruling upon the matter that it is so -- so they perished.

Because they decided by what destroys them and effaces their lights, so they were slain.

And they are the slayers of themselves, since they conjectured upon themselves the non-existence of their body, and decided upon themselves that there is no life for them after their death.

Then they opposed the truthful Informer who draws them to their felicity, so they did not believe in him; and for this they perished and were slain, and nothing destroyed them but themselves, and nothing slew them but what they were upon. So understand.

Then know that the First Intellect and the Supreme Pen are one light; so its relation to the servant is called the First Intellect, and its relation to the Real is called the Supreme Pen. Then the First Intellect attributed to Muhammad (God bless him and grant him peace) -- God created Jibrīl (peace be upon him) from it in pre-eternity.

So Muhammad (God bless him and grant him peace) was a father to Jibrīl, and a root for the whole world.

So know -- if you are of those who know; may he be ransomed who reasons, may he be ransomed who understands.

And for this Jibrīl halted [short] of him in his Night-Journey, and [Muhammad] advanced alone; and the First Intellect was named "the Trustworthy Spirit" (al-Rūḥ al-Amīn) because it is the storehouse of the knowledge of God and His trustee.

And Jibrīl is named by this name [the Trustworthy Spirit] from the naming of the branch by the name of its root. So understand. And God knows best.